EUROVISION 2023 - General Discussion thread

[ESC United Mod Team]

This thread is for any general Eurovision 2023 discussion not limited to or specifically about any country's national selections or song choices.

 

[MopManMoss]

I must have missed this debate.

Card you use to vote? I know not every country has the same way of voting, but I've never heard of a card -?

Well Australia uses cards to vote at eurovision but obviously the rest of us at eurovision use phone/sms, the rest of the world vote will be using card for obvious reasons

 

[AlienSoul]

To clarify: a Credit or Debit Card.

 

[Deleted member 12761]

I have a problem with this year 's contest: I like a lot of songs, but I can't see an Eurovision winner among the songs I like. Tbh, I don't have a song which gives me strong winner vibes but maybe it's only me...

Finland is among the favourites, but I can see Käärja struggling with the Juries in the Final, Norway is a personal favourite, but has basically the same problem, Czech Republic can be an outsider, but it could be seen too dark of an entry to succeed, Austria is catchy, so I can see why it has a lot of bubble support even though I dislike it, but realistically will flop with the Juries, Germany is not jury material at all, Spain, France and Italy will be boosted by Juries, but downgraded by televoters, Serbia is totally a televoting pleaser, but I'm not so sure it will impress juries... I think the discrepancies between Televoting and Jury vote will be huge. And I can go on. Maybe one thing is true: if Loreen wins Mello, only her can lose the contest (even if Euphoria was million times better than Tattoo), because it is one of those songs which can do equally well with both televoters and juries.

I feel the same. I think this year started bad but now that we have almost every song I think it's really strong. Right now I have 6 potential winners on my list and I too think Loreen is going to win. Personally I'm rooting for Loreen, Serbia or Czechia. I also see Finland, Norway and Ukraine in the picture. Very interesting year.

 

[midnightsun]

Why has actually nobody mentioned so far that we have so many songs this year sung (at least partly) in their own language, like…. never before???

 

[Chrisiam]

We don't need a language rule, the acts will do it themselves!

 

[MooseShoes]

As someone who has no idea of what things cost to people who have actual money, I couldn't help going back to Ticketmaster and checking out the suites option just in case.

£14000 for the Family Show, £45000 for the Live Final. On the bright side, that's a ticket for you and 11 other people.

Also, according to this BBC news article, despite the arena's full capacity being 11000, in the end there were only about 6000 tickets on sale for each show. @MopManMoss, you were right all along.

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-64784428

 

[gigi_copp3]

We have four internal choices to be revealed... and in two days all the finals will have finished

 

[FilipFromSweden]

Also, according to this BBC news article, despite the arena's full capacity being 11000, in the end there were only about 6000 tickets on sale for each show.

Are you serious

 

[empo21]

Well, unlike sport events, some portion of the seats are unusable, because of the stage/backstage and the standing area isn't big enough to make up for that.

 

[crashworld]

We have four internal choices to be revealed... and in two days all the finals will have finished

Can't believe we are down with 6 entries (ie. Greece, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Portugal and Sweden). I have zero hopes in these countries to give me my top favourite this year. I am low-key looking forward to 2024's contest.

 

[HayashiM]

Can't believe we are down with 6 entries (ie. Greece, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Portugal and Sweden). I have zero hopes in these countries to give me my top favourite this year. I am low-key looking forward to 2024's contest.

I am probably not feeling as bad about this year as you are, but for me 2023 is the weakest edition since I'd started following in 2017. Kind of looking forward to 2024 as well.

 

[vavera4ka]

Couldn't it be viewed as a positive that there isn't a clear winner (yet)? It leaves the contest open and gives a lot more excitement for who will win.
I, personally, love that it isn't obvious who will take it home. (I'm rooting for Finland.)

Last year, it was pretty clear Ukraine would win. No surprise whatsoever. And I remember in '12 and '13 how it was clear who the winner would be even before the contest had started because all the buzz had been centered around Loreen and Emmelie in those years.

I much prefer it like this, with no clear winner and thus everyone could be the winner.

idk, every year people say that it's not obvious who is going to win, that there are so many good songs that can win, or that there's no clear winner and we will get the "safes" choice that can appeal to both jury and public, yet every year the winner is exactly who has been leading the bookies for the longest time. Even if there's a last moment awesome rehearsal that blew everyone away.
Countries climb and fall in the positions 2-26, but the winner is always someone who has been topping the odds. And i kinda hate it.

 

[LakZaNokte]

I think 2 months between deadline for entries and esc week is waaay too much. That gap should be narrowed.

 

[Mainshow]

I think 2 months between deadline for entries and esc week is waaay too much. That gap should be narrowed.

It´s already quite "narrow" since they have to gather all entries, investigate if they meet all critera and press them on CD´s, vinyl´s and send them to digital platforms.

Artists also need this time to work on their stagings, performances, choreographies.. and they can still use the time to meet, get in touch with fans, perform at Eurovision pre-parties, etc.
It´s actually already a huge part of the whole Eurovision experience (for fans and artists alike)

 

[Betwixt Tales]

I think 2 months between deadline for entries and esc week is waaay too much. That gap should be narrowed.

It´s already quite "narrow" since they have to gather all entries, investigate if they meet all critera and press them on CD´s, vinyl´s and send them to digital platforms.

Artists also need this time to work on their stagings, performances, choreographies.. and they can still use the time to meet, get in touch with fans, perform at Eurovision pre-parties, etc.
It´s actually already a huge part of the whole Eurovision experience (for fans and artists alike)

They have to build and send props, which then have to be reassembled, checked that nothing got ruined on the journey, and if so, be remade. Some of them take a whole lot of work (look at Armenia last year).

They have to put together the order of the songs, which again is depended on the amount and size of props that have to be moved back and forth in the small amount of time the postcards/commercial breaks give.

Speaking of the postcards. I don't know what they are planning to do this year, but if they involve the artists, those have to be recorded and edited for the show.

Some years they made a theme song that everyone has to record vocals for.

Two months is really not a lot of time considering the size and amount of work that has to go into making such a big production for all three shows.

 

[empo21]

Speaking of the postcards. I don't know what they are planning to do this year, but if they involve the artists, those have to be recorded and edited for the show.

To add to that, they do involve the artists this year and they're filmed in their own countries.

I only know of Joker Out and Blanca Paloma who have recorded their postcards so far.

 

[randajad]

I must say that I share the sentiment that the overall quality of the entries for has been somewhat disappointing. However, amidst the underwhelming selection, there are a few standouts - Czech Republic, Slovenia, France, and Italy have all imo brought a unique and fresh sound to the competition that is deserving of praise.

On the national level, I must commend Serbia for their exceptional selection festival, which not only showcased the wide range of the country's musical talent but also demonstrated exemplary organization and production. Also, Eesti Laul boasted an impressive lineup of artists, but unfortunately, the song choice failed to deliver the same level of quality.

Although Croatia's entry deserves credit for its bold and socially conscious message, the song itself is not for me, but I said that a few times already. Ultimately, while there have been some promising moments in this year's competition, the overall quality of the entries is not at the level we would expect from recent editions. However, with the competition still ongoing, we can remain hopeful that we may yet witness some truly exceptional performances in the weeks to come.

 

[Ali_]

I must say that I share the sentiment that the overall quality of the entries for has been somewhat disappointing. However, amidst the underwhelming selection, there are a few standouts - Czech Republic, Slovenia, France, and Italy have all imo brought a unique and fresh sound to the competition that is deserving of praise.

I love Italy's entry, it's in my top 5, but it is a standard Italian male ballad. Wouldn't call it unique and fresh.

 

[MopManMoss]

The impact of who the hell is edgar

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1634126492522143745

 

[harey]

Why has actually nobody mentioned so far that we have so many songs this year sung (at least partly) in their own language, like…. never before???

Really? That's interesting because I had the feeling last year that it was a great year for language diversity at esc but not this year (I will take a look at it). But having one or two sentences in your own language when 90% of the song is in English doesn't feel to me like singing in your own language (I absolutely love aija for exemple but for me it's a song in English, even if it's nice to have some words in Letton language and the way it's put in the song is nice). It's not the same thing to me to have a song in a language, a song mostly in a language (or a verse / chorus in different languages) and having just some words in a language. I feel like it could become like a esc gimmick to send a song in English with a few words in your language just to show "eh look, we are from xxx country so we put some words you won't understand in a song which totally feels like a song in English". (Well, by reading my message it feels maybe harsh I hope that what I mean translates well.)